IT’S the semifinals and Chris Ross knows every game in the Smart Bro-PBA Philippine Cup best-of-seven series will be one hell of a war.
But the San Miguel guard expects just a game of basketball, not exactly the 'dirty tricks' which he said Rain or Shine players had been dishing off especially during Thursday night’s Game Two which the Beermen lost, 105-97.
“That’s not basketball. I can do with any physicality, but when its dirty, it has no place in basketball,” said Ross, who appears to be bearing the brunt of the Elasto Painters’ ire since the start of the series.
Ross initially had a run-in with coach Yeng Guiao as he was about to inbound the ball in front of the Rain or Shine bench in Game One.
Then, he found himself involved in a couple of physical plays with Chris Tiu the next outing, including one in which he was called for a backing violation after getting bumped hard in mid-air by the Elasto Painters guard as he tried to receive a pass.
The back-up guard refused to single out any particular incident that infuriated him, but insisted the opposition had been playing beyond the bounds of the game.
“There’s a lot, there’s more than one,” Ross said when asked what he was referring to. “That’s not my style. I just want to play. If that’s what they want to resort to, then that’s them.”
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Ross expects the nature of the series to remain that way for its entire duration, especially with both teams locked at 1-1 going to Saturday’s Game Three at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
“It’s a battle. People are trying to win a championship. Every game is getting to be hard, every game is gonna be a war,” he said.
But hopefully, the Beermen and Elasto Painters will just play fun and clean basketball, no more, no less, according to him.
“When it gets to other stuff than playing basketball, that’s when I have a problem,” he said. “I just expect no place in basketball for things like that stuff.”